Joseph Racheli holds a Coor's Pure Malted Milk brochure. The brochure is one of the dozens of historic items Racheli found in the second floor of his building at 336-338 Main St. Most of the artifacts are on display inside his restaurant, Racheli's Italian Delicatessen, on the first floor of 338 Main St.
(
LEWIS GEYER
)

LONGMONT -- Patrons of Racheli's Italian Deli are being treated to items illustrating more than 100 years of downtown Longmont and Front Range Colorado history.

Artifacts, antiques and everyday items from the late 19th and early 20th centuries have been positioned inside, alongside and atop of a set of display cases by Joseph Racheli, who bought the 336-338 Main St. building in 2005 and opened the Italian Deli at 338 Main in April.

"I call it 'The Times Capsule,'" Racheli said, because his deli's building also is known as the Times Building, having housed one of Longmont's early newspaper operations.

A thermometer from the Chicago World's Fair is one of dozens of historic artifacts Joseph Racheli found in the second floor of his building.
(
LEWIS GEYER
)

Racheli said the exhibition includes "oddities from every decade" since 1879, the year the building was constructed -- including numerous items from the late 1890s and early 1900s that were left behind by several generations of previous businesses and residents who'd once owned, leased or even lived in parts of the building. The second floor spent 60 years of service as a downtown boarding house.

Racheli said when he bought the building, there'd been various businesses occupying ground-floor space in recent years, but "the upstairs had been locked up for more than 40 years."

The second floor is being converted to a studio by artist Gary Markowitz, some of whose works are now on display on the walls of Racheli's Deli.

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Racheli said he found "a mix of stuff" ranging from rare bottles, to personal notes and letters, to traveling salesmen's pamphlets, to vintage newspapers and magazines, to the Bavarian and English pieces of China and the tools once used by the people living or working there.

"A lot of it was mixed in with trash and debris."

He discovered a stamped coin that said it was "good for one loaf of bread," as well as a souvenir thermometer from the 1933 Chicago World's Fair and a large 1915-era glass jar that once contained Coor's Pure Malted Milk mix.

There's a collection of shoes that he said came from one set of occupants, a family that owned a chain of shoe stores elsewhere.

"There were quite a few mysteries in there, too," Racheli said.

Wrapped inside a 1907 Denver Post colored comics section -- comics pages now posted on one of the deli's walls -- was a playbill photo of an attractive actress -- an item Racheli speculates may have been saved by a boardinghouse tenant who may have been a fan.

Racheli said he'd welcome visitors to stop by and examine the displays. He's also inviting people to let him know if they have any information they can share with him about the businesses and people his building once housed.

He said he plans to keep the present display up until early September and then probably will consolidate some selected items into a couple of cases.

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